patrick.net

We need to hold the poor and irresponsible parents accountable.

All the talk about cutting teachers and instituting pay for merit has got me thinking that we should just cut right to the root of the problem...BAD PARENTS!!! Having grown up poor with BAD PARENTS, here are some facts I know to be true:

1. Poor kids with BAD parents choose stupidity over education
2. Poor kids with BAD parents choose MTV, BET over education
3. Poor kids with BAD parents choose to be cool over educated
4. Poor parents reproduce at 3 times the rate of responsible wealthy counterparts...they have less to lose and heck, the government will take care of them. This applies to all impoverished nations around the world, the situation is the same everywhere...just look to India and China.
5. Poor parents are too busy working, so they leave their children at home to raise themselves
6. Poor people are not lazy, they just dont care. They DON"T have the mental fortitude to know how to ascend they situation yet we blame the teachers who are in a no win situation.

You may say that I am beating up on the poor, however, I grew up extremely destitute so save the lectures. The only thing that has transformed my life was my resiliency, education and the fact I did not latch on to the improverished mentality of my friends while growing up. Without my drive to do better I would have wound up like any other poverty stricken child...HOPELESS.

Since only 1 in about every 10 kids has the internal desire and drive to excel wouldnt you say that we need a PARENT RESPONSIBILITY act more than anything else? What changes do you see as being necessary to influence our childrens mentalities?